Analysis

What is "sexual minority"?

"members of sexual orientations or who engage in sexual activities that are not part of the mainstream"; or "members of sex groups that do not fall into the majority categories of male or female, such as intersexuals and transsexuals" (UC Berkeley Gender Equity Resource Center, 2012).

4 categories

L

esbians

G

ays

B

isexual

T

ransgender

(Source: CartoonStock.com)

It is important to note that, in ancient times, same-sex intercourse and romantic love for those of the same sex existed as part of normal and everyday life. The desire to measure, define sexual orientation and gender is a relatively new phenomenon in human history. The terms homosexual, heterosexual, and transgender were coined by some modern psychologists early in the 20th century. Concepts of same-sex intercourse as immoral were constructed by the society; sexual minorities started to be marginalized and excluded (State University, 2012).

In addition, when talking about sexual minorities, one may first come up with physical interactions between couples or physical appearance of them. However, one should be reminded that emotional and spiritual factors also contribute to the identity of heterosexuality, homosexuality or bisexual. There has been attempts to collect the data of the proportion of LGBT in the world, but it is very difficult to do so due to this reason. Some may be very relunctant to expose their sexual identity due to the social hostility and unacceptance to LGBT, some may be even afraid of their sexual orientation which is very different from the socially-constructed norms that they will not expose their identity (State University, 2012).